


Clawing the Curtain, Climbing the Wall

by Mamcine_Oxfeather



Category: The Nice Guys (2016)
Genre: M/M, Never say the V-word, Paranormal AU, gladiator, slight Gladiator crossover
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-18
Updated: 2018-10-18
Packaged: 2019-07-28 16:03:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 895
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16245104
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mamcine_Oxfeather/pseuds/Mamcine_Oxfeather
Summary: Jackson Healy has been doing this job for a long time.  A long, long time...





	Clawing the Curtain, Climbing the Wall

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Asian_Aaron_Samuels](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Asian_Aaron_Samuels/gifts).



_We'll tie it down, wait it out_  
_And hope our memories hold_  
_A lead-white nail driven down_  
_A hundred years ago_  
_Feeling wheels on my old road_  
_Feeling bought for what I sold_

-Blind Pilot

**: : o : : O : : o : :**

Late autumn sunset chases the heat of the day through every Los Angeles avenue, sweeping pavement of its sun-baked warmth, battering litter from its alleyways with the hot exhaust of its motor vehicles, the acrid sigh of a drunk with a smoking habit passing out on a bus stop bench. The shops down this busy two-way road hunker behind a thin fence of streetlamps, foundations overgrown at the edges with pull-weed and scrub, their rooftops zoning-law flat to spare the view of the high rise condominium buildings further in from the curb.  A glinting pair of eyes waits in the neon-red alcove of the comedy club, heavy hands busy with a matchbook, cigarette hidden behind the meat of a thumb-heel.  When the convertible squawks to its stop, Jackson Healy beckons from his shelter, squinting out at the girl - the kid, really - who shuffles colt-kneed from behind the wheel to clamber over the convertible's passenger door.  Amelia Kuttner all but throws an envelope at Jackson, staggering across the wide pavement of the sidewalk on a pair of cork wedges, a flounce of sugar perfume through the dull heat of the Los Angeles sunset.

Jackson catches the envelope with a snap.

Amelia bends to adjust the strop of her shoe.  "I wrote the license plate number down, it's in there.  Look," she straightens, pulls her hair out of her face, voice quavering.  "I'm really freaked.  He keeps showing up everywhere, like,  _stalking_ me."

Jackson taps the envelope on the brick at his elbow.  "It's light," he gruffs, blue leather jacket chirping as his weight resettles.

"I, I used large bills," Amelia mumbles, parting the alcove to let a woman pass through the vividly painted club door.

Jackson sighs a billow of cigarette smoke, clears his throat and tilts his chin to thumb through the envelope of money.  "Seven dollars short," he interrupts Amelia's departure.  "We agreed on three."  

Amelia's shoulders creep up toward her ears but she flings her hands out, decisive, and stomps to the waiting convertible.

Jackson peers out from under the neon red pocket of the comedy club entryway to squint at the moth-battered yellow wash of the streetlights overtaking the smoggy taupe of the L.A. sundown.  He steps out to follow Amelia to the convertible, a tall bruiser with a bachelor's scruff of salt-and-pepper stubble, lithe in his movement despite the bulk of him, the wide chest and barreled stomach of a pomade strongman, an original Boston-street boxer, a campaigned Roman General.  He accepts the crumpled mash of dollar bills and spare change, grunting once to temper Amelia's departure, so that he might count the money, straighten it out, tap it into the envelope with a tight smile.  "The problem will be -"

The car peels out, knocks a tumbleweed into a wind-snagged newspaper, and lurches a hard pavement-scraping turn off onto the highway, red tail lights winking out behind a dense curl of decorative hedge.

Jackson lowers his eyebrows, fishes his reading glasses out of the breast pocket of his Hawaiian-print button-down, and studies the numbers scrawled across the pink cow stationery he'd pulled from the envelope.

**: : o : : O : : o : :**

They never did expect it, this time of night.  Bars let out, patrons vulnerable on the road or in the street, sober marks asleep in their beds.  Unsober marks asleep in their beds, too, apparently, for the man that answers Jackson's knock reeks of sour whiskey, cigarette barely hanging onto his sagging bottom lip, striped pyjamas on backwards.

Jackson snaps his light gray uniform jacket straight, brandishing his clipboard up to tap at the unreadable small print.  "Neighborhood complaint about a smell of gas coming from the property," he fibs in a nasal deskjockey drone.  "We take these calls seriously, mister March, so you must forgive our immediacy at this hour; very dangerous you understand -"

"Fuck!" March hisses, kicking the door wide.  "Jesus, yes, get in here already." He waves Jackson in with a frantic glitter to his bloodshot eyes.  "I can't smell.  Junior usually checks all the pilot lights before bed, but I guess she took a walk ton-"

Jackson kicks the back of Holland March's knee, scruffs the neck of March's shirt in his fist as he stumbles, to hold him aloft.  "Amelia Kuttner wants you to leave her alone."  He kicks the door shut after himself, drags March to the kitchen to throw him against the island bar.  "Repeat, so I know you heard me."

"Amelia!  I'll leave her alone!"  March pants, elbows propped stick-stiff on the countertop.  "I-I'm, I'm not a  _creep_ , I'm an Investigator -"

"And half the pedos in this town are 'talent agents',"  Jackson drawls, searching his pockets for his knuckles, coming up short because he'd left them in his blue jacket.  Christ, he was getting old.  "Or 'movie producers'."  Shrugging, Jackson heads in bare-fisted; not like this guy was an especially leathery-looking string bean.

It is when Jackson's punch meets the rock-hard plane of Holland March's abdomen and practically bounces off, that a sick surprise of worry finally stabs up between his lungs, like an old war wound pouncing its memory at a car exhaust's crackshot backfire.


End file.
